


Love

by Lusalma



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Naruto
Genre: Blood and Gore, De-Aged Harry, F/M, Gen, Implied/Referenced Brainwashing, M/M, Manipulation, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, death of children
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2018-01-25
Packaged: 2019-02-11 01:30:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12924414
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lusalma/pseuds/Lusalma
Summary: Harry ends up in Naruto under Unpleasant Circumstances.Will he be able to find Love?





	1. Chapter A

**Author's Note:**

> I am going to be cross posting this story from fanfiction.net to archiveofourown.org 
> 
> Same username.
> 
> I will be writing Harry Potter and Naruto (since it is so frequently used) but I am not an obsessive plot purist of Harry Potter or nitpicker of the story characters’ personalities. So it will be OC and it might have inconsistencies, if so please tell me. 
> 
> I am a slow updater, I will torture you with long waits between updates.
> 
> There will also be gore.
> 
> THE IDEAS OF THE HARRY POTTER UNIVERSE IS NOT MINE- IT IS J. K. ROWLING. I am not make money on this.  
> ^ (That was a disclaimer)
> 
> The ideas and long term actions of OC characters are mine but everything else is not.
> 
> I have a weird way of writing 1,000 words per chapter then consolidating them into Chapters A, B, C, etc. Each Chapter A, B, C, Etc. will be 5,000 words or more.

Chapter One

When a human being is born into this world they arrive wet, naked, cold, and in pain. If they are lucky they will not die in the same way.

  
Harry was never lucky.

  
About 76 years after the final battle, and about 75 years after he graduated his 8th year of Hogwarts Harry James Evans Black-Potter was finally breathing his last – in his birthday suit, freezing, soaked, and in agony.

  
Harry hadn’t planned to leave the world in this manner. His great-grandchildren from his deceased ‘wife’ Ginny shouldn't be put through the grief of finding him dead in the potion cellar. Well, at least Harry thought it would be his great-grandchildren that would ultimately be the ones to find his corpse since there was a family reunion planned in this house for his 93rd birthday.

  
Harry actually considered it to be kind of silly that he would die in this manner. After all he had survived that evil psychopath Tom Riddle and then had survived his fanatical Death Munchers retaliation attempts. They didn't touch him of course- he had the privilege of being trained by several groups of the most vicious fighters he could find alongside the most brilliant minds of his generation and the most strategic battle master of the world - so of course those pathetic attempts didn't faze him, but of course his late wife Ginevra’s psycho lover got the drop on him when other villains haven’t been able to in decades.

  
Ginny had been his Hogwarts sweetheart and he had of course married her immediately after he graduated from Hogwarts.  
But just as usually happened to young couples that married in their late teen years he and Ginny really didn't know each other, and really didn't even know themselves.

  
So, when Ginny had married Harry, he was still going to Wizards College in London, England and she was about a month out of her 7th year of Hogwarts. Not too soon after the honeymoon she was already giving birth to his first son – Albus Severus Potter. And she kept having a child every two years like clockwork till she died in 2008 after birthing his last son, one Draco Neville Potter. Her death had ironically occurred due to the continued stupidity of the Ministry of Magic and the laziness of the Mediwizards which allowed the remnants of the Dementor race to invade the Maternity ward of St. Mungos and suck out the souls of 54 infants and mothers, including Ginny's soul, who fought so hard she was at least able to save her newborn son. This death was considered ironic for Harry because his perpetually pregnant wife was the one who insisted on going to St. Mungo’s to have the baby instead of having a home birth with a Midwife.

  
Of course, Harry had sued the hospital for allowing dangerous creatures to attack his wife and child and ended up owning over 74% of St. Mungo's. This ended up being a good thing later in life, of course. Mostly due to the Civil War of Britain in 2033 over the sudden ‘unveiling’ of Wizards and Witches among the muggles (aka: non-magical/mundane) in a Live BBC broadcast that was focused on an interview with Prince George the Duke of Cambridge and how his volunteer actions in Britain was revolutionizing the culture of London. The Minister of Magic had not appreciated Fred and George Weasley 'expanding' their business of laughter into the muggle world. Harry had always thought Fred and George really didn’t expect such a huge reaction when they exploded onstage beside their longtime friend Lee Jordan, who had coincidently been the interviewer. Their arrival happened just as an advertisement was starting about the coming attractions at Magic Amusement Park, right towards the end of the first break in fifteen minutes on international live television.

  
During this Civil War Harry had wished that he had spent less time trying to save and repair a permanently damaged society that didn’t want to be saved and had instead concentrated on his children's lives and keeping his friends closer than his enemies.

  
Maybe then he wouldn't be dying alone on this sacrificial alter or even dying at all, after all he still had plenty of centuries left in him!

  
Harry also wished his dead wife’s psycho lover who was killing him didn’t think that this bogus ritual really did bring the dead back to life. It was really irritating to hear a crazy person muttering something like, "wonderful Gin-Gin….Going to be together forever! ...when you are, back everything is going to…. Ginny, love wh…" and other such nonsense ramblings during a ritual that Harry could tell was never going to work.

  
The fact that this is happening years after Harry had ‘recovered’ from the grief of her death and his rage at having her cuckolding revealed in the Daily Prophet just seemed to be twisting the knife in his side.

  
Harry really didn't try to hold onto that anger though. After all it was getting kind of hard to think with dizziness and pain saturating his mind, probably due to whatever drug the guy dosed him with…and maybe due to blood loss from his grossly inexpert skinning of Harry’s arms and chest.

  
Harry never had liked the scars on his body that came from the war and all his school boy adventures but at least he could remember how and why he had gotten those scars… but now there was only red meat and dripping blood.  
'Well, at least he hasn't touched my waist or anything below…'

  
Harry twisted his mind away from that thought and fiercely contemplated the fact that he really should have updated his will because by the end of this night he would most likely no longer be in this world. After all he intimately knows what the feeling of approaching death tastes like.

  
Just as the Insane Psycho started digging into his forearm with that stupid little pocketknife Harry struggled to remember regrets and prayed that he would be forgiven in the Next Adventure.

  
The only regret Harry could profess was the wish that he had kept his friends and family closer than his enemies. Maybe then he would have enjoyed life more.

  
He also probably would have been able to honestly say at the end of his life, that his life had been worth something to someone. That his life had been worth something beyond money, something beyond his actions, actions that Harry always considered should have been common sense. Harry wished he had loved enough that those he loved would think of him with something other than apathy and a bewildered 'who was he again?' five to ten years after his funeral.

  
…Harry also wished that while he and Ginny never really became very close beyond the perfunctory escort missions and thin surface niceties that society lived under, Harry had wanted to perform his husbandly duties but without the help of potions he just was unable to.

  
Harry had known Ginny cheated on him… not just due to the fact Harry really couldn’t ‘perform’ with her but also all the little inconsistencies that connected into something he had not wanted to know.

  
He now knew that when she said that she was going to be taking a business trip to Australia or Ethiopia that she was really going to visit the Psycho. He didn't really begrudge her that, she used her own money to do so (he checked) and at least she kept it safely hidden from the family…unlike some married couples he could talk about.

  
Harry had also done his husbandly responsibility such as when Ginny got anxious or angry and he would try to console her by going with her to a session with the St. Mungo’s Mind Healers and he had always honestly try to patch up their relationship. But Ginny would always get restless again; she would start leaving for longer and longer periods of time that would eventually end in a screaming match between the two of them behind closed doors.

  
However, Harry had loved her... in his own way. Harry had especially loved his beautiful children. Children Ginny had given him and while they were not his (again, he checked) they were still his.

  
But through all the war and through all the pain and the heart ache and the soul deep introspection that Harry worked through, Harry had found one thing to be true.

  
He had always found Love to be stronger than Hate.

  
Dumbledore had been right and wrong. Once Harry started loving someone it was his greatest strength but it was also his greatest weakness. Mostly because once he let someone in, he just couldn’t let them go.

  
Dumbledore was also right in the fact that his parents love was what saved him during the First War and his friend's love was what saved him in the Second War.

  
But Dumbledore was wrong in that Harry's ‘power the Dark Lord knows not’ was love. Harry's ‘power the Dark Lord knows not’ was his luck and his stupid, persistent instinct to always survive. After all, Harry had to learn to love. He didn’t know what love felt like or how to give love and Harry was only able to learn of love after Tom Riddle was dead… for the second time. But even if Harry understood love like Dumbledore thought he had it would have done nothing to keep Harry alive.

  
'Just look at my relationship with Ginny,' Harry thought bitterly as he hissed in a pain soaked breath through his teeth as yet another strip of bloody flesh was ripped from his body, 'though I loved her as best I could and as well as I could, we still always had those screaming fights, and she still slept with people like the Psycho who is now ripping my skin off 65 years after she died. I loved her but right now I probably hate both her,' Harry admitted painfully. But he also understood that you could love someone and hate them too.

  
Harry can just imagine the disappointed looks righteous Dumbledore might have given him for that uncharitable thought.  
Now, maybe Harry was being too harsh. It wouldn’t be Dumbledore giving him the looks it would probably be the Wizarding Public because while the Wizarding Public has gotten smarter and had attained some common sense since the British Civil War Harry also firmly believed that there must be something in magic itself that causes the practitioners of magic to lose all frontal lobe activity after several years of exposure or use.

  
Harry had this theory mostly because even at 93 years old Harry was still the hottest topic of magazines and newspapers in the Magical World. Now Harry might be the richest person on the planet but the wizarding world didn’t know that. After all Harry had sealed all his heirlooms and wealth and books in a chain on his ankle to avoid losing any sentimental mementoes to the vengeful hands of the goblins long, long ago.

  
Now he and the goblins were on better relations now but Harry guessed that keeping the majority of his possessions on his person had just become a very strong, paranoid habit, so strong that it might as well be the Runes tattooed on his skin... or on skin that used to be there.

  
Harry suddenly gasped in surprise as a thick, surprisingly sudden whiplash of red fire seared across his senses.  
Choking through the agony Harry heard a demented cackling not too far from his panting form and the pop and hisses as something wet and heavy was slapped onto something hot.

  
After a couple of minutes of sizzle the sweetly sweet stench of what seemed to be roast pork wafted through the air and Harry was finally able to control his breathing and he slowly opens his eyes.

Acknowledging the fact that he had been able to successfully detach himself from the ongoing torture due to Occlumency and distraction he could now only feel how heavy his limbs felt and how very tired he was as he approached the precipice of Death.

  
Harry had felt this sensation several times throughout his life. But this experience was no comfort as his end approached.

  
Several minutes of peacefully floating bliss was interrupted as something wet and cold and smelly was smeared over his face and upper chest. Harry gagged at the uniquely vile filth and then started choking as the Insane Psycho shoved several globs of what tasted like rancid diarrhea into his mouth.

  
Harry never did catch his breath after that.

  
\--------

  
Several hours later Harry's great-grandchildren finally arrived in front of #12 Grimmauld Place in London, England en mass. Of those 63 relatives present it was a little girl of 3 years old that was curious enough and disrespectful enough of the King-Of-Magic who followed what seemed to be the odor of burnt pork into the potion cellar. There she found the blackened and tortured mess of who she later found to be her Great-Grandfather Harry Black-Potter.

  
But all she would discover at that exact point in time was the terror of cadavers and how loud and high pitched a true scream of fear could be.

Chapter Two

After what felt like an infinitely long time spent floating in nothingness and choking on filth Harry was finally able to suck in one heavenly breath of air. And then another and another.

  
He still felt the pain of his wounds but the burning need for air in his lungs wasn’t so crucial anymore.

  
While lying there gasping in short, sweet breathes of air Harry could vaguely make out some human voices in the distance.

  
Given the fact that the voices seem to be composed of both male and female tones Harry assumed that his relatives had finally arrived for his party.

  
Given the fact that the Psycho wasn’t cackling or cutting him that probably meant that the Psycho must have run off when he had heard the crowd approaching.

  
However, Harry did note that he could not smell that sickly-sweet stench of burning pork or hear the sizzle-pop of the flames that the Psycho had started in his cellar.

  
Feeling a growing sense of unease. Harry, having finally caught his breath, tried to stand up but quickly fell back onto the alter with a groan of pain as his chest flared with burning agony.

  
Panting through the pain Harry’s sense of unease grew while the agony died. It wasn’t as painful as it should be… and the ground under him was not the altar.

  
The Psycho had skinned him; Harry should be feeling the slick of blood draining from his body and the raw agony of the grass digging into the muscles in his back.

  
…Harry had no grass in his cellar.

  
Harry’s eyes popped open with this revelation and he started to roll sideways.

  
Because even though he didn’t really know where he was now, he was not where he had been. And it was usually a good idea to get away from where ‘they’ initially dropped you. Especially, if you were Harry. The kidnappers had most likely dropped him in the middle of some horrific rune sequence that would turn him into a cannibalistic monster.

  
Harry suddenly stopped rolling with a grunt of pain as he slammed into something solid.

  
Glancing over his shoulder cautiously, because it would be just his luck to roll right into his waiting captors, or a barrel of acid, he saw brown. The brown was part of the trunk of a tree that as he craned his eyes upwards got higher and higher, bigger and bigger.

  
Gaping in awe at the largest tree he has seen since the Forbidden Forest’s Heart Wood Harry wondered why his captors would deposit him outside at high noon in October.

  
Closing his mouth with a decisive snap Harry’s eyes narrowed as he realized that it was supposed to be summer, it was supposed to be his birthday.

  
Using the trunk of the tree to slowly sit upright Harry scanned what he now saw to be a meadow surrounded by trees whose species he did not recognize.

  
Having finally sat his butt onto the root of the tree he was sitting under Harry furrowed his brow.

  
Either the tree was bigger than any he had ever seen before or someone had shortened his spine.

  
Finally glancing down with trepidation he noticed white.

  
Clear, white skin that covered what looking like a little boy’s body and what looked like a teeny tiny ding-a-ling.

  
Harry’s mind blanked white.

  
Passing thoughts started coming to his attention faster and faster.

  
He didn’t feel the pain he should because he wasn’t skinned anymore.

  
His ding-a-ling was no longer his pride and joy and, dammit, he has to go through puberty again.

  
He felt shorter because he was shorter.

  
He still had his anklet and his runes (somehow) but no clothes and no glasses.

  
He could see just fine, he didn’t need glasses. Is that because his eye sight hasn’t gotten that bad yet or that the eye correction from before is still working?

  
He was cold because he had nothing covering him and if he didn’t get covered soon, in this wind, he would freeze.

  
His stomach was aching but it might be because of hunger or that goop that he was previously been choking on which might or might not have been poisonous.

  
His mouth was dry and tasted like crap and now he recognized that he is thirsty.

  
This shrinkage might be the result of a potion or curse or a ritual.

  
If it was a potion, that wasn’t permanent, then he would revert to his real age and his skinned condition might kill him.

  
If it was a curse, unless he knew the counter curse, it was permanent.

  
If it was a ritual, he was screwed.

  
The voices he had been hearing for a while now have been getting louder and louder, thus they had been getting closer.

  
Harry snapped his head up as this last thought pinged his danger senses. Harry quickly looked around the clearing to pinpoint the approaching voices and then hid himself behind a tree at a right angle from them, that was far enough away they wouldn’t see him.

  
Several minutes after Harry had settled down into shivering silence a group of people walked into the clearing while casually chatting.

  
Harry narrowed his eyes in concentration to hopefully see more detail.

  
It was a group of ten to fifteen Asians who wore some form of archaic clothes and tools.

  
The long black hair which seemed to be typical and the yellow eyes with red eye makeup were all indicative of either a family or a cult that was trying to mimic someone or something.

  
Given the fact that all he could see were chattering women and children Harry suddenly worried about where the men went.

  
The women were carrying backpacks and scrolls or sitting in the wagons that the oxen were pulling.

  
The children ran dangerously close to the huge wheels of the wagons and in between the oxen legs, the same oxen that were heading towards the center of the meadow and thus the sun dappled grass with singled minded determination.

  
Harry started easing backwards as his danger senses pinged, away from the family of women, children and oxen that had regressed considerably from the twenty second century.

  
The family that according to his senses was magic but not.

  
The family that seemed to have no protective men but were still laughing and smiling and talking loud enough for anyone to hear them coming kilometers away.

  
The family that he swears had sounded like women and men just moments ago.

  
Harry suddenly was brought to a sudden stop as a huge hand suddenly clamped down on the top of his head.

Chapter Three

Harry jerked violently and then tried to run. The key word is try.

  
Usually when someone, that you don’t know, clamps their hand down on any part of your body it is a very good idea to try and get as far away as fast as you can. If you can escape the grasp then you probably escaped a serial killer or a rapist... or a practical joker. If you can’t get away you were already screwed, usually, so what was the harm in trying?

  
Harry unfortunately was not able to escape the hand of steel that had fastened itself over his head and as soon as he made movements to escape he felt the grip tightening down and an arm closing around his stomach.

  
Feeling his feet leave the floor Harry stilled into vibrating tension and prayed that he wasn’t going to be killed, again. Because even with the women and children right in front of him the hands holding him might not be a part of the group and if he wasn’t then what if the Hands went after the other children when Harry escaped or died? Or what if Hands was part of the group and he was going to be made a slave?!

  
If the Hands let go then great, Harry could take him out and escape! If the Hands killed him then at least the women and children in front of him will be leery enough of possible danger to give him a head start.

  
But as the Hands started walking through the trees towards the clearing and Harry twisted and squirmed he still couldn’t make the bands of steel around his head and stomach budge an inch. At least he now knew that the Hands and the group in the clearing were probably together, otherwise the Hands would be backing away not moving forward.

  
While Harry had been imitating a worm on hot pavement Harry caught glimpses of movement up in the trees and in the surrounding shadows as the Hands jerkily stepped into the sun-drenched meadow.

  
There was silence and Harry stilled.

  
Feeling the familiar pressure of eyes on him he heard a gentle woman ask, “Desu?”

  
Noticing that the bands of steel had loosened up a smidge Harry gave a lunge forward and freed his head, but was unfortunately jerked up short from freedom by the fleshy leash around his stomach.

  
Dangling forward about a foot off the ground and hanging by your stomach is not a comfortable or fun way to be carried.

Grabbing the arm that was holding him prisoner Harry steadied himself against the body of his assailant and proceeded to mule kick any part of the body holding him captive that he could reach.

  
Hearing a weird rumbling coming from his captor Harry paused in his struggles to wonder if he was going to explode, hopefully not – blood was so hard to wash off. But nope, of course not, the Hands was laughing at him.

  
Hearing increasing noise and chatter coming from the group of women and children in front of him Harry twisted his head to look towards them and frowned at the gossiping women with the evil smiles hidden behind hands and their gestures towards him and a low hum of conversation…that he could not understand a word of.

  
Unable to hold back a slight whine of growing despair Harry twisted back around to try and kick the Hands and just as he proceeded to kick, he was dropped.

  
Curling into a fetal position from the pain Harry proceeded to do a forward roll away from the Hands and finally felt his feet hit a hard surface which on a quick glance was a huge wheel of one of the wagons that were stationed in the center of the valley… crap, wrong direction.

  
Lunging into the relative safety of the underside of the wagon Harry ran smack dab into another kid a bit bigger than he. Thankfully the kid didn’t fall over but the pale skinned, dark haired brat did backhand Harry across the face hard enough for him to hit the ground. Ouch.

  
Harry gasped in surprise at the new pain in his jaw and rolled sideways to get to his feet and away from the surprisingly vicious child.

  
While rolling in the opposite direction of the brat Harry heard one of the nearby women bark an incomprehensible word that nevertheless had a tone of reprimand in it.

  
But that could be a reprimand for the child not killing him as much as hitting him.

  
As he watched suspiciously the Brat sneered at him in disgust, mumbled something, and then just stalked away. He just walked away like backhanding a smaller child was normal, or even expected. Brat.

  
Sliding more cautiously into the darkness of the underside of the wagon Harry carefully and gingerly laid down on his chest with his palms flat and his legs half curled under him. To allow him better leverage for a sudden burst of speed…and to hide his profile away from those who might be watching.

  
But by the time he had settled into his crouch and was prepped and ready to move he noticed that his tiny dangly bits were waving in the wind…with nothing to block the view.

  
Blushing with mortification but staying still was one of the hardest things he has had to do in what felt like the past decade… stress and adrenaline can do amazing things.

  
While continuing to blush like a red cherry he noticed that Hands, who was a male now that he could see him, who had originally caught him and dumped him into the middle of the camp seemed to have finished talking to the woman who had greeted him.

  
After accepting a bundle of cloth from the women Hands started casually strolling towards his hiding place, waving a cheerful hello to all the distant men that were now emerging from the woods and smiling as those same men gave bloody animals to the women or tossed the mutilated corpses onto the floor around the campfires… so unsanitary.

  
Tensing in anticipation of the coming confrontation Harry prepared for the battle of his life and just as he was ready to spring a surprise attack Hands bent over at the waist and tossed the bundle, hard, right into Harry’s face.

Chapter Four

Aborting a lunge when a ball of cloth and harder materials smacks you right in the face is difficult. Especially, when you are straining you ears and eyes to try and keep track of dozens of moving people that might stab you if given the chance and with your cheek already throbbing from a previous blow.

  
Untangling himself from the length of cloth was a nerve wracking experience as he struggled to keep himself from blindly flailing around in panic and denial.

  
These cruel people who dragged him kicking and squirming away from his tree and hit him were giving him clothes? This did not compute.

  
Crouching there for several long moments after untangling himself Harry waited for the other anvil to drop on his head. While doing so Harry could ignore the aching of his body the grumbling of his stomach. When no other movements were made towards him, whether good or bad, for several moments, he slowly relaxed.

  
Curving his back into a more comfortable position and keeping his head tilted sideways so as to keep watch on the people around him from his position under the cart he slowly dragged the now dirty cloths and other stuff towards himself.

  
Even though he absolutely, positively, abhorrently did not want to accept anything from these awful people he couldn’t just go running around in the world with nothing to cover his fragile and now blemish free skin. Well he could but it would be embarrassing and it would probably hurt…a lot.

  
Shaking out the shirt which was made of stiff unbleached linen, which resembled a button down but was asymmetrically long on the curves and had ties instead of buttons, Harry got most of the dirt off both himself and the shirt and proceeded to shove his arms into the sleeves.

  
Unable to figure out exactly how the shirt tied close Harry knotted the trailing edges in front of his chest and let it go.  
Then Harry grabbed what seemed to be pants made of what looked to be roughly woven hemp, he shook those out as well and leaned back onto his butt to shove his leg into the leg sleeves.

  
With both legs not covered Harry rose to a crouch and pulled the pants over his bottom…well this isn’t the first time he’s gone commando but this is the first time the pants were such a stiff and scratchy material.

  
After freeing his feet from constrictive cloth at the end Harry finally tied the rope around what seemed to be part of his pants that closed and set to figuring out the shoes.

  
The shoes weren’t that hard, they seemed to be wooden sandals with hemp in the front holding the toes and two blocks of wood on the underside…Harry could already feel the blisters forming.

  
Opting to not wear the torture devices until he absolutely needed to Harry returned the majority of his attention to the surrounding kidnappers and finally noticed a tempting smell wafting off one of the nearby fires.

  
The bloody animals Harry had noticed the males bringing to the females earlier were now hanging skinned and gleaming with herbs and oils over a fire on a spit while the slightly older children did their chores which seemed to consist of turning the spit of meat over the fire under the supervision of the women.

  
Swallowing some reflex vomit upon remembering his own skinning and sympathizing with the small animals Harry tried to ignore the gurgling demands of his now protesting stomach.

  
Harry held his position through the cooking, serving, and cleaning up of the meal before he slowly approached the cooling left overs that one of the woman had left near a fire when they went some little ways away to clean.

  
Just as he was starting to inch his hand towards the tempting food that he had been smelling for the past several hours there was a demanding bark of sound right behind him.

  
Jumping and thus lunging away from the food in fright Harry twisted around and stared wild eyed at the Brat who had hit him earlier.

  
That Brat was now staring at him with a frown on his face and his hands on his hips, the classic pose of disapproval that all Mothers the world over hold over the heads of their disobedient offspring.

  
Jabbing his finger at Harry the Brat started chittering a rapid-fire stream of words, with that high-pitched tone of voice that is prevalent to children everywhere and with the absolute incomprehensibility of an unknown foreign language.

  
Seeing that Harry was staring in incomprehension and wary mistrust at his moving hands the Brat rolled his eyes, heaved a put-upon sigh and before Harry could do more than widen his eyes and attempt to run away the Brat had grabbed his ear viciously and started dragging him over to a nearby knot of women who were doing something mysterious with threads of string and a wooden contraption.

  
Yelping in pain and twisting every which way to claw at the iron grip the Brat had on his person Harry sought to escape his inevitable fate. His fate of becoming a slave!

  
Having finally arrived at his destination the Brat swiftly twisted the ear to make Harry turn towards the group of women.

  
Jabbing his finger at Harry while talking to the women the Brat talked in a tone of voice that people used for the mentally retarded. Staring at the Brat through watering eyes and in confusion of what he was saying made the Brat sigh once again and then point at the women and then moved his head up and down, up and down.

  
Then the Brat turned and pointed towards the fire and nodded his head up and down, up and down.

  
Tilting his head curiously Harry mimicked the movement. Scowling in anger the Brat shook Harry’s ear firmly.

  
Barely holding down a whimper Harry’s eyes watered anew. Turning in a 90 degree angle the Brat pointed towards a group of lounging men and shook his head side to side, side to side. Then the Brat pointed towards the perimeter of the clearing and shook his head side to side, side to side. Harry mimicked. Growling audibly the Brat pinched Harry’s ear viciously and threw him forward to land among the women.

  
The women startled and looked down at the sprawled Harry and then looked up at the Brat before saying something in a scolding tone of voice. The Brat grumbled back a response and then stalked away.

  
Frozen from the pain and the shock of the fall Harry jumped slightly when one of the women clothed in pink arose and approached him, crouching beside Harry as she crooned and smoothed his hair back.

  
Staring up at her wide-eyed Harry wondered why this woman, who smelled of lavender, would stroke his head. She might be trying to lull him into complacency or she might just be trying to comfort him.

  
Having that thought Harry ducked his head away from the hand and shuffled away slightly. Then Harry blushed when his stomach gave a loud and demanding growl of hunger.

  
The Lavender woman chuckled slightly and rummaging in her dress handed him a piece of bread that seemed to be stuffed with something.

  
Cautiously taking it from her Harry sniffed to see if there was any scent of poison. He inspected the entire loaf for any points of entry or discoloration. Seeing and smelling nothing unusual Harry took a small bite and slowly chewed for any weird taste.

Finding anything different turned out to be pretty impossible since he had never tasted anything like this.

  
Shrugging his shoulders Harry decided that he might as well satisfy his stomach if he was going to die anyway and started inching towards the Lavender women, who had since returned to whatever she was doing, and settled slightly behind and to the side of her.

  
Eating.

Chapter Five

Seasons Arrived and Departed.

  
Harry learned how to function in a group. He also learned to talk their language and how he could contribute to the Clan. Basically Harry learned what he had to do to eat.

  
That rude man with the huge hands that had grabbed his head and thrown him into the campsite was Haruto of clan Orochi and he was nominally in charge of this branch of the clan. Mostly because he was the youngest son of the clan head who was unable to go on this expedition that seemed to be traveling the lands and gathering supplies. But really the one who actually ran the show and made the decisions was Old Man Chinatsu of clan Orochi.

  
The reason Harry kept adding ‘of clan Orochi’ is because that was this group pounded into Harry as ‘being polite’ and everyone had seemed to take part in the lessons.

  
Harry was considered too young to know what being in a clan meant but he had the bad feeling that they considered him part of their clan anyway because they had found him.

  
The Brat, who by the way was the main instigator of almost all fights Harry ended up in was Sota of clan Orochi and he was an arrogant little rat. He kept getting into fights with the other kids, which he constantly lost by the way, about how he was going to be Orochimaru in the future. Harry thought that this must be some type of title but nobody would explain it to him.

  
The nice women who smelled of Lavender and fed him was actually Akiko of clan Orochi and she was also the wife-to-be of Haruto. Harry felt bad for her, having to marry such a brute but she didn’t seem to take much offense or mind Haruto’s manners towards her or Harry. Actually she didn’t seem to really care what Harry did as long as he wasn’t destroying something or getting hurt. She even ignored him running through the oxen’s hooves as they were traveling! Well besides yelling at him for almost spooking the oxen.

  
Harry was the smallest child in the camp, the only one smaller was the unborn child one of the women was carrying.

  
But Harry’s problem right now started because during bathing time one day Akiko had once tried to take off his anklet but the spellwork held strong and she couldn’t get it to come off and as soon as she stopped paying attention to it she forgot all about it.

  
Sota however, being a pain in the butt, kept noticing the chain and when he did he then subsequently tried to rip it off Harrys ankle. If he couldn’t get it he started accusing Harry of stealing it but as soon as he stopped paying attention he forgot. But he noticed it again and started attacking again, it was aggravating and got really tiring really fast. Some adults actually started slapping Sota upside the head every time he started yelling about Harry stealing jewelry, due to how often this cycle happened.

But the Old Man started noticing.

  
Also, due to Sota’s constant attacks on his person, Harry started mimicking some of the men who were some sort of fighter/hunter.

  
But by doing that the men seemed to think he was trying to become one of them and started teaching Harry some little cantirps and tips and movements and stuff. The clan Shinobi according to their oral history were the valiant protectors and warriors of the Orochi clan and they won all the battles they ever went into.

  
Harry didn’t really mind the attention and the men were nicer in sticking around and teaching Harry then aggravating him like Sota does.

  
They taught him how to move silently through the woods and how to trap and skin the squirrels and rabbits and stuff they caught. They also taught him how to throw those star knife things that they carried everywhere. Harry didn’t understand why they had them, they made hitting the target so hard, but when Harry was able to hit the target it did make a nice sounding thunk into the wood.

  
The women of the camp were pretty nice too… most of the time. They taught him what plants to look for that were good to eat and how to actually dress himself properly in what he learned was a summer yukata with geta and the pants were actually supposed to be underwear, Harry blushed for days after learning that he had been flashing his underwear before… like they hadn’t seen everything already.

  
It was peaceful for a most seasons but one summer Old Man Chinatsu started paying more attention to Sota and then seemed to ‘discover’ the Runes on Harry’s skin. The anklet had a forgetfulness spell attached, thank God, but his rune tattoos didn’t.

Harry never did figure out how to put the rune for forgetfulness onto his tattoo network without having his whole body be forgotten by everyone around him, it had caused some pretty bad situations back home, at least till the temporary rune tattoo wore off.

  
At first there were just some questions about how he got them. Harry hemmed and hawed and finally blurted out that he didn’t remember.

  
Then Old Man Chinatsu started asking about what they meant or what did they do, like they had to do something. Harry started to grow ever more paranoid about Old Man Chinatsu’s questions and started trying to hide from him.

  
How did he know that the runes might be able to do something? Did he know they were runes? Did he recognize them as a rune network?

  
Usually seeing runes denoted danger, like the bright colors on a poisonous frog.

  
But without the appropriate supplies and with no knowing where he could get them they basically signified the years of study that boiled down to nothing but wasted space in his head and on his skin.

  
It all came to a boil when Old Man Chinatsu grabbed Harry one day and forced him to sit still next to a fire. He then grabbed a scroll and started comparing whatever was in there to the runes on Harry’s arm. Harry grumbled and squirmed but the Old Man had an iron grip.

  
Whatever he was looking for he didn’t find. He was growling and grumbling under his breath for days after that uncomfortable experience and then one day he gave a final grunt of frustration and then went to talk to Haruto.

  
Around five to six nights later Harry was bundled like a rug into the back of a much smaller cart and was taken away from camp towards the rising sun. The driver never did tell Harry where they were going but the way the driver was moving the cart they needed to get there in a hurry.

  
But for right now…Harry was experiencing the joys cart-sickness.


	2. Chapter B

Warning: I do not have copyrights to Harry Potter or Naruto. I am not making money off this fiction. Please do not sue me.

Chapter 6

Traveling for days on end was never fun. Especially if you are stuck in a pre-industrial cart and you traveled from dawn to dusk and only stopped after it was already dark. Harry and the driver were also the only ones traveling these roads. Harry hadn’t seen any other travelers whether on foot or cart. So Harry’s only source of entertainment were some chests and scrolls but the Driver, who Harry recognized as one of the ‘shinobi,’ never unpacked anything and always shoved some type of dried bar consisting of nuts and grains and meat at Harry during meal time. He wouldn’t even talk with Harry!

At least meal time was taken in the cart twice a day and that was only time Harry was allowed to eat. The Driver didn’t allow Harry to wander around and try foraging as he had been taught. Strangely while Harry ate he never saw the Driver eat? 

For the first few days that was a blessing in disguise because after puking up everything he had eaten for the last week he didn’t have to see someone else eating any food. But it disturbed Harry because you can only starve for so long before you die. The Driver didn’t even offer to help with the motion sickness or anything, he just gave the food, watched Harry eat it and several moments later puke it all up. 

Sadistic. 

At least the Driver didn’t skimp on the water and he didn’t seem to expect Harry to stay up all night and day like the Driver had been doing.

So, either the Driver either didn’t need sleep and/or was an insomniac or slept with his eyes open or he didn’t need to eat. Harry did see him drinking the same water that Harry was drinking and he saw the chest of the Driver rise and fall as he breathed but otherwise, it was very creepy.

After about four days of constant nausea and travel Harry finally screwed up the courage to ask the Driver where they were going. Of course the Driver didn’t respond, maybe he was also mute?

After Harry adjusted to the cart and lost his motion sickness he then needed to help with the frantic unloading and reloading of the cart every dawn and dusk. This was hard work! Even though Harry never saw those boxes or scrolls unwrapped or opened they were so heavy that they had to contain something! Which as disturbing because the scrolls were just rolled sheets of paper, Harry had seen the women working on similar things at the camp…

As time passed Harry noticed that the Driver consistently traveled so fast that Harry couldn’t see anything in the woods besides blurring trees and the Driver seemed to deliberately take the animal trails that barely allowed the cart passage and sometimes the Driver made his own passageway in the underbrush and trees!

In the time Harry had nothing to do he contemplated escape. Harry had always striven to escape the ego-centric and cruel people that had originally kidnapped him but Harry didn’t know anything about this continent beyond that small ‘shinobi’ clan.

Either way, by day seven of their journey through the woods, Harry had exhausted all ideas and now he was insanely bored.

The Driver was not talking to him and nothing was happening. The food and water was the same thing all the time and there was nothing for Harry to do or work on. He could contemplate the various horrible ways that he could die or how he could escape or he could try and sleep but Harry didn’t want to do that, he already did those things more than enough to be sick of them.

Harry also had the unfortunate tendency where his imagination was so strong and robust that if he contemplated how to escape or ways he could die or what could happen in the future Harry ended up daydreaming for hours. But that could only take his mind off his boredom for so long and it was more like a nightmare then a daydream.

Anyway, Harry was bored. To try and alleviate the boredom Harry started playing some traveling games that he used to do with his kids. I Spy didn’t really go anywhere beyond I see something green and brown. Yea, trees… 20 Questions didn’t go for more than an hour one day because you can only talk to yourself for so long before you started feeling like you were crazy. Tic Tac Toe wasn’t too bad but after the last 47 ties it just wasn’t any fun anymore. Hangman’s Noose was boring because he already knew all the letters and he couldn’t exactly Obliviate his own memory, now could he? Harry had a little more fun with the alphabet ‘I’m Going on a Picnic With...’ but after the fourth or fifth repetition it got harder to find twenty six different items for a picnic without going nuts.

And still, after all those games and nightmares and adjustment Harry was still bored by the end of the day. He also kept getting smacked upside the head for bothering the Driver too much, or being too loud, or fidgeting too much, or breathing too much. Harry didn’t know what to do!

After several more days of fighting to stay still and silent and trying not to let his mind melt out of his ears due to boredom Harry was almost ready to start contemplating drastic measures when he started to smell salt.

Harry wasn’t crying, the Driver didn’t seem to be crying? …No he wasn’t showing any tears. Harry couldn’t see anything other than trees but he did soon start hearing some seagulls by the time the Driver stopped for the night. The next day the salt and the seagulls were still there and by noon Harry could start seeing glimpses of blue through the trees on the right.

Was the Driver bringing them towards the sea?

That would be great!

The sea usually meant trade with ships and thus more escape routes!

…But it also meant pirates and scurvy and diseases and rats and slavery and…yup Harry hopes they’re not going to a particularly busy port.   
And they didn’t seem to be. By the fourth day of following the cliffside coastline Harry and the Driver had been traveling for more than twelve days and Harry was contemplating making a run for the cliff edge and just trying to take a swim.

But the one time Harry was able to sneak past the Driver and look over the edge of the cliff in the light of the predawn sunlight there was nothing down there but foam and rocks and waves that seemed to be reaching up towards him so they could drag him down to meet their watery embrace.

Yeah… no swimming for Harry. Harry didn’t even know what temperature the water might be at! If it was too cold Harry could be jumping to his own death, what with his reduced body mass and the thin cloths that he wore.

However, one good result of the Driver taking the cart along the coast line is that every night after they stopped he would take a net and toss it over the cliff. After tying the rope down somewhere close to the camp but not in the camp the Driver would then pull up a net full of crabs or clams or octopuses or sometimes fish the next morning and they would actually have something different to eat for breakfast other than those hard bars!

Harry did enjoy the new views and the new food and the different smells and sights but after eight days of traveling along the coast and after getting bored of trying to hit the seagulls with rocks Harry was bored again. There was nothing to do!

Harry didn’t realize how social having more the ten people in a group could be or how learning a language and skills from multiple people kept you from contemplating how freaking bored you were or the fact that you had nothing to do all day.

Harry was bored, bored, bored, bored, bored. Traveling sucked.

Chapter 7

Harry shouldn’t have jinxed himself.

The very next day, after Harry had curled himself into a miserable ball of boredom inside the cart and wailed his despair from the depths of his mind the Driver stopped the cart, got off and left.

At first Harry thought the Driver was going to go to the coast line and start casting nets and fish, as he had been doing for the past week or two. But the Driver went in the opposite direction of the sea, and disappeared among the trees.

Harry was embarrassed to say that it took several hours before he even noticed that the Driver was not returning, he honestly thought the Driver had gone for a bathroom break, which would have been a first for the whole trip but which was sorely needed! After all, Harry went off to the opposite side of the road and had his own bathroom break…

Either way the Driver had proven that he was a tough character and Harry might only be six or seven year old body development but he knows some tricks to survive and the Driver had proven more than wily in controlling Harry on the trip so far... The Driver had controlled Harry throughout the long trip and Harry had even started actively pursuing mischief recently! Thus the Driver couldn’t have been caught in a trap, or animal attack, or ambush... at least it was highly unlikely…

Harry decided that it might be in his best interest to find out where the Driver went exactly, now.

Peeing behind a tree or taking a dump behind a bush did not take several hours and if it does something is wrong physiologically with the person. Something might also be wrong with the situation but either way Harry needs to find the only native guide he has in this strange place and even if it is embarrassing he might need to rescue him as well.

…it was after several hours of walking randomly forward that Harry realized walking into the woods, away from the cart and the deer trail they had been following and into territory that Harry had never seen before probably wasn’t the best idea.

But Harry was not lost and he was most definitely not bored anymore…he wasn’t lost, he knew how to get back to the cart! Harry just needed to follow the tree trunks that he scratched with a knife…that he did not have on him. Harry cursed his old instincts that insisted he knew what he was doing and yet his youthful attention span continually tripped up his desire to follow his instincts.

Harry almost fell into despair and proceeded to grow some mushrooms under a large trunk in the hopes that his stupidity would transfer to something said stupidity would not immediately kill. Hypothetically of course! Harry wasn’t dead…yet.

Harry didn’t know how long it had been since he started growing mushrooms, his depression would at least have been useful for keeping track of time! But he soon started sensing a presence growing stronger and stronger the longer he sat under the tree. Harry eventually turned around and was able to see a large and dangerous figure getting closer and closer to his crouched position. Harry froze and shifted his body in preparation of fight or flight.

Suddenly a pale face with long, dark hair and purple makeup dropped upside down from above him, right into Harry’s face and significantly obstructing his view of the mysteriously approaching figure from the distance while simultaneously freaking Harry out.

Harry jumped in fright from the drop scare and scrambled backwards, he didn’t want to be that close to the freaky face!

Harry finally realized that the face wasn’t moving when the guy, who looked like a girl, flipped gracefully from the branch above Harry and landed with impeccable grace in front of him.

Harry had long since buried himself in the thorny embrace of a bush that was positioned conveniently to the side of the tree and thus right behind him and was disjointedly trying to untangle himself.

The man didn’t seem to care that Harry was trying to escape him or that Harry was even struggling.

Harry was finally able to get to his feet and was shaking off the last clinging remnants of the bush from his clothes just as the hand of the man reached down to grab him.

Harry twisted and presented his side profile to the man as he prepared to run but the man was faster. He grabbed Harry’s upper arm and jerked up.

Harry wasn’t a lightweight but he wasn’t as heavy as his cousin and yet that man lifted him like he weighed about the same as a book.

Harry stiffened and employed several tricks some of the ‘shinobi’ from the family group he was originally with had taught him. Such as twisting against the man’s thumb, anchoring his legs against the man’s midriff to gain leverage and stability, and even striving to bite the man’s arm. None of these maneuvers seemed to work, the man even seemed to read Harry’s mind before he finished each maneuver.

Harry was well and truly caught and he didn’t like it at all.

The age of five to six is the age that most normal, magical children exhibit their first signs of accidental magic. Harry of course did his first piece of magic at three with the Dursleys’ (as he learned later) but here in this strange and dangerous environment he still hadn’t produced anything. If Harry couldn’t feel the hum of magic through his runes he would think that he had become a squid but if he really was a squid his magic wouldn’t allow the runes to warm and shift in response to the environment and his needs. Harry really, really wishes that he could produce some accidental magic right now and just Apparate away from this creepy guy. 

The creepy guy hasn’t even said anything yet! He just picked up Harry by the arm, which is really hurting now by the way, and started walking somewhere into the woods! Away from the cart and cliffside ocean!

‘He’s creepy and weird and I really don’t want to be here with this possible child molester right now…so if I can go somewhere else right now, please?’ Harry wished fervently towards his magic, that he thought he could feel somewhere in his thoracic cavity.

Nothing happened, same as it nothing happened when Harry wished the Brat to catch on fire or the Hands eyeballs to fall out his head or even that the Old Man would forget about him and his runes and leave him alone!

Harry continued to struggle for freedom and just as he was about to escape! The man exited the forest tree line but it didn’t look like they had gone anywhere Harry had been to before. For one there was this huge castle thing that reminded Harry of an Indian temple that had vines growing all over it, and was that a tree growing out of the side of the wall? Either way the man was approaching this ruin and as they got closer Harry could see men, and women, with similar features to the man that had snatched him lingering in alcoves and windows.

Harry could count fourteen at a first glance.

Harry was internally panicking. The kidnapper had brought him to his lair which was infested with his compatriots and things weren’t looking too hopeful. 

Chapter 8

Harry attempted one last escape attempt before he stopped actively hunting for an escape. Mostly because of the thought that maybe these scary people were stupid enough to allow him to escape. They probably weren’t but one never knew, right? And the people watching him seemed to change moment by moment.

But Harry was unable to escape, as expected. And as he was trying to wrestle with his current creepy look-a-like captor, the guards that Harry had noticed lingering on the edges of the temple grounds approached and surrounded the slowly advancing Creep Train…after all from the top it probably looked like a train of people moving forwards, right?

Harry gives up. He had tried to escape that gypsy family unit and was unable to even leave the boundaries of the camp. Unless of course he was escorted by the ‘shinobi.’ He had tried to escape the Driver during that long cart journey and been unable to even leave the camping grounds and now he couldn’t even escape the Creep Train.

Harry felt like a failure. As an agent of England, he should have been able to escape his captors but at almost 7 years old he couldn’t, even with decades of mental experience behind him. 

The Creep Train has entered the atrium.

The atrium was unnervingly empty. Where were the stereotypical women scurrying to clean everything before the men returned to dirty it up? Where were the children that seemed to be constantly underfoot and screaming their existence into everyone’s ears? Looking around as the Creep Train advanced Harry uneasily concluded that he might be the only child here. Which is not a good sign.

A child’s behavior was usually indicative on the general mentality of the culture or the cult that raises the child. If the child is elusive and skittish that culture is probably fairly violent or fearful. If there are tons of children in view and they are all playing and screaming in joy then that culture is most likely very peaceful and loving, which can be a good thing but also can leave that culture open to violent attacks from other cultures that target the children. To have no children visible was usually indicative of extreme paranoia or violence so strong that it killed all the children that were once here.

And in this temple, as they traveled the empty halls and echoing rooms, there was not one child visible. Which was really concerning Harry because if they tried to kill him then he would probably die. Te couldn’t even run away right now! Not suspended in the air! 

The fact that there were no children peeking around the doorway to see what the commotion was, no children racing fearlessly underneath the adults’ feet, no children sleeping in corners or on beds, nothing. That was scary all on its own.

Harry had been growing more and more alarmed and he has now officially entered the freaked-out phase. That the Creep held him in place on the Creep Train had yet to let him down and the other guards hadn’t even looked at him before falling into place around him and the Creep was pushing Harry closer and closer to a panic attack. 

There was no children to be seen or heard except for Harry. The creeps looked very similar to Harry’s first kidnapping group too which just made him more uneasy because he knew how intelligent the gypsy family camp could be… Maybe he was sent to be the human sacrifice?

Harry didn’t know if the resemblance was familial or if everyone on this continent looked the same, after all most of the Asian citizenry that Harry saw when he had been living in England all looked very similar to each other. 

The Creep and the guards then marched into one of the biggest rooms to date. It looked like a jungle, but Harry could see the stone ceiling through the leaves of the trees overhead and the guard’s feet were passing over stonework that was so good that it seemed like a seamless flow of grey water. Harry once again started squirming, trying to get into a more comfortable position when the guards started slowing down. That was bad, very bad. When the kidnappers arrive to their destination it never spelled good things for the kidnapped.

There was a throne ahead… There was a man on the throne…if that wasn’t the most pretentious thing Harry has seen since arriving here he didn’t really know what pretentious was.

The Creep Train, still carrying Harry flowed to a stop at the foot of the throne and bent down onto one knee. For the first time since he was picked up Harry was within reach of the floor.

But there was nothing to grab onto and the stillness of the guards and the heavy weight of the stare of the Pretentious Guy on the Throne was making it more and more difficult for Harry to concentrate on escape. Maybe he was judging how good Harry would be as a sacrifice?

There was a rustle of footsteps and cloth behind the kneeling guards. Creep still hadn’t let go of Harry so he had to crane his neck around to even glimpse what was approaching from behind them. Which was fairly painful and yet Harry was unable to resist the suddenly strong need to figure out who was approaching.

After a while of fruitless twisting Harry was finally able to see the shadowy figure approaching, it was the Driver! Why was that abandon-er coming into this huge haunted temple now? Was he coming to rescue Harry? Or maybe he was coming to accept his payment from the Throne Guy. 

He sold Harry out, didn’t he! Harry glowered indignantly at the traitor.

There was a softly scornful huff of air that escaped the Throne as the Guy commented, “Quite a rebellious thing, isn’t he?”

The Driver drew level with the kneeling guards and bowed in reverence, saying nothing.

Harry switched his glower from Driver to Throne Guy and scowled dangerously at him…well as dangerously as a little kid could which wasn’t very. As that thought coagulated Harry stopped his futile effort to intimidate Throne Guy and returned to trying to wrestle himself free.

“So, Elder Chinatsu stated that the little feral has some sort of seals on him? Seals that are not responding to the typical methods?” Throne Guy practically drawled as he gazed with heavy lidded eyes at the Driver.

The Driver bobbed his head up and down in what Harry thought was affirmation.

“And what does this have to do with me? Take the child to the Masters and let them figure out his seals. Also, make him stop that insistent wiggling…he reminds me of a worm.” This last statement was sneered through lips pursed in disgust.

Everyone before the throne seemed to bow deeper in acknowledgement and then stood as one and turned to the right.

They were approaching what Harry at first took to be a solid wall that slowly resolved itself into a cleverly hidden door.

The Driver cut to the front and opened the door with a respectfully lowered head. The Creep Train passed through the entrance-way one by one till there was only the Creep left with Harry dangling in his grasp.

When the Driver had opened the door Harry froze and stared intently at the dark doorway. He could hear sounds of movement and inaudible voices with short bursts of clangs and clatters every now and then, metallic? Maybe there was civilization hidden in the walls?

…That was really paranoid.

The Creep approached the doorway, the doorway to Harry’s future.

Chapter 9

Right… it seems that Harry’s future consists of tunnels.

Tunnels were introduced to Harry when he was twelve and he discovered the Chamber of Secrets with that huge snake inside it. Since then he has explored and even lived in them for decades. Mostly due to war and fame and other reasons that amounted to other people forcing him underground. Harry had decided long ago that tunnels aren’t that bad as long as you don’t have a sense of claustrophobia. Which had mostly been beaten out of Harry by the time he was seven, after all the Dursleys wouldn’t tolerate a claustrophobic child who screamed every time he was shoved in the cupboard. 

Harry has also found other women and children. After the Creep Train had delivered him to the kitchen, or what looks like the kitchen, and then disappeared into thin air…which was very creepy. The Driver had also disappeared, again, sometime during the long walk.

So, Harry had been delivered into the hands of the Ladies of the house who then subsequently assigned him to another group of kids around his physical age.

There was about five of them and of those five three were bigger then Harry and insisted on proving their seniority from the get go, usually by trying to shove Harry around. 

Unfortunately for the kids Harry refused to become a doormat and as soon as one child tried to shove him off his feet Harry was pushing back…and biting and clawing and attacking any soft spots he could reach, which weren’t that effective when you don’t have long arms but for six or seven-year-old kids Harry’s reach was more than enough to make the trouble makers leave Harry alone. 

But something that Harry did not expect to happen is that by beating down the troublemakers and ensuring his privacy and personal space he seems to have become the leader for the other children to look up to and/or bring their problems to.

After several instances of the children in his group complaining to him about getting no food or one of the other kids picking on them Harry went up to one of the silent caretakers that were always hovering on the edges of any room and brought up the kids concerns.

The Caretakers looked down on Harry with unnervingly blank eyes and stated in a monotone, “And what are you going to do about it?”  
Harry was unpleasantly not surprised.

In his previous gypsy group, the ones who originally kidnapped him, Harry thought that the indifference and the carte blanche way of parenting was only a symptom of Harry being the youngest child as well as being a foreigner. Here Harry was learning that it wasn’t just Harry syndrome, it was just how these people treated their children. This fact was starting to grate on Harry and his temper started simmering fairly early on, almost as soon as he was deposited with the Kitchen Ladies.

So, he can understand teaching the children to survive on their own in the wilds, after all this nomadic lifestyle has surely lost or misplaced a child at least once or twice a month and by teaching them to survive they upped the chances of the children living through this negligence. 

Meanwhile, as Harry ruminated and watched the social dynamics of this group, specifically the school group that Harry was placed in that was currently being taught the written language. Harry discovered that he hated kanji with a passion. And the reading of kanji, as taught by orders from on high of course, and basic arithmetic, so you don’t get cheated when working with goods and money, and of course the history of the clan and all the battles and wars the clan won, within which Harry could practically taste the propaganda when they went over the great and glorious history of their ancestors. 

Harry thought that the fact that even a stray foreign kid was getting the same education as the biological children of the guards was a good indication of the mindset of this ‘clan.’ The skewed ‘history’ towards how great the clan is and how evil everyone else is was also not only stoking Harry’s temper but also grating on Harry’s inherent curiosity and increasing his general distrust of authority figures.

Just recently though, like within the past couple of days, Harry’s group was being coached in things called ‘katas’ and they were being handed blunt knives and taught how to best stab and or swipe at another person, usually an adult, to cause the most damage. 

This new training was being taught outside in a secluded glen and Harry could see other groups that were the same age as his and some older. This was good because Harry could see the progression of speed and strength as the groups aged up.

Unlike other cliques Harry’s seemed to consist of the runts and those who looked so sickly that they might well be liable to tip over and die at any moment. 

Harry was angry and he was worried. He had yet to see any sick kids in the surrounding groups and those that he was sure had been sick or were getting sick seemed to disappear between sunset and sunrise. Given the fact that he and all the kids he saw were eating rice and vegetables at most, he knew they weren’t unwitting cannibals.

The adults were no help and when he tried to hold a conversation to gather information from those older children they just sneered at him and then attempted to hit him…most of the time they missed but Harry already had enough head blows to last him a lifetime and so he made sure to stay out of arm’s reach of those he knew to be short tempered.

Hearing the whining of the children was also irritating in the worst of ways and the fact that they looked up to some child that was the same age or younger than them caused Harry these pangs of grief that just made Harry angrier at these sub-par adults that shouldn’t even be caring for a goldfish.

So, Harry knew he was sinking deeper and deeper into a morasses or negative emotions but until he could see a way to fix the situation all he could do was strive to the best of his ability to make sure all the children that looked up to him got the correct portion of food and that the food didn’t ‘mysteriously’ disappear from their bowls to ‘appear’ in another.

Harry endeavored to make sure that the children washed correctly and quickly at the end of the day and that all scratches and wounds were properly cared for. 

Harry also made sure to always find a protected alcove for all of them to sleep as a puppy pile while far away from the vicious pranks and hazing of the older children.

Harry kept those children alive and yet he found that more often than not he failed. Just yesterday the runt of the runt pack passed away in his sleep and Harry woke to find his stiff corpse buried under the other kids.

Harry was so furious that he wanted to cry and yet he couldn’t because as soon as the first bell rang the Caretakers came to collect the body and slap the other kids into position.

Harry found that he hated this place. Harry could hate the people too, almost. 

Chapter 10

Hate is exhausting.

Over the course of the months and years that Harry stayed within those dingy, cramped tunnels Harry progressed from the basics of writing, reading, arithmetic, and history into writing copies of the books from the library, helping the accountants and sitting in on mass councils where his ‘elders’ discussed politics and warfare throughout the continents and sometimes held meetings with other clans.

The katas and spars in the glen progressed to mass staging’s of war as would be done against another clan, practice of procedures for specific situations – such as assassinations or theft or guarding or search and rescue – meanwhile competitions between groups were fought for rewards and prestige.

Harry’s Runt Squad still consisted of six members in total with Harry having to defend his ‘right to leadership’ almost monthly. However, the original Runts were no longer among the living.

…As Harry grew older and stronger and saw past the masks of the animals that caged them. He also more easily saw the death and disposal of countless innocents.

He still attempted to care and feed and save the few that he was allowed to speak for but even with his best efforts the harsh conditions and the careless disregard to the safety of the children that seemed to be cultural in this clan, killed them more swiftly than Harry could save them.

The First probably died due to sickness or starvation, he was so skinny Harry couldn’t tell.

The Second died during a spar with a separate clique. All cliques, or ‘squads,’ were taught to go for the weak spots of their opponent and this bigger kid just so happened to crush the trachea of the sweetest little boy Harry knew.

The Third most certainly died of sickness. The flu that was spreading like wildfire through the creche just seemed to spring up and sink its claws into her lungs and just never let go. She died drowning in her own blood.

The Fourth died during a survival exercise in the swamp when a gator grabbed her leg and dragged her under. Harry sought to violently pursue and save her but the others of the group dog-piled him and then the Caretakers smacked them all back into position Harry was unable to see her yet alone save her.

The Fifth, the last original, was the one death that probably broke Harry. That one died through carelessness. Sometime during their training all children were taught of poisons and their effects. How to make them and how to cure them… if it was at all possible. The Teacher for their introduction decided to teach them the dangers of poison by cooking them all lunch and telling them to eat. Harry’s Runt was only one of many who wasn’t able to sense the poison until too late.

Throughout this culling and torture the cliques of children around Harry merged and grew, then lost people and merged again. Harrys’ was no different. The Caretakers lectured and harried and herded children into groups and told them they must survive and when there was a solitary child who refused the creche leaders warned them once and then the single child almost invariably died.

The Loners who survived were given the respect and awe of prodigies and treated both more harshly and yet given preferential treatment.

After the Fifth Runt died Harry fought ruthlessly for the title of a Loner but upon seeing another Loner being conscripted as the apprentice of a visiting ‘shinobi’ Harry allowed himself to seamlessly blend back into the group.

Harry hated being singled out, he loathed being dragged in front of the Elders and their Master of Sealing due to them wanting to study his tattoos almost daily. That season of life was more than enough torture for him, thank you very much. 

However, after several months of no progress the Elders and Master did eventually decide that Harry’s parents had been crazy and tattooed their son for religious reasons and thus he was useless and could be tossed back into the crèche.

Harry was thankful for that decision but due to suspicion that the Elder’s hadn’t exactly lost all interest in him Harry began using the bandages amply provided and wrapping every exposed inch of skin. When Harry could find a still pool of water and he glanced into it he saw his long, dirty black hair, green eyes and a body wrapped like a mummy from Egypt.

But nobody had yet discovered that his runes were changing, thank Merlin. Harry still couldn’t access their magic but they were changing and moving their position on his body as he grew. His anklets had grown with him and Harry believed that he could access the charms after he figured out a little more of this ‘chakra’ thing. 

Unfortunately, being in a crèche left little time for the individual to be alone and the few times Harry was able to access his anklets potions he was only able to get a vial of Growth and several other Health potions before he had to conceal his charms once again.

But Harry needed those potions the most due to constantly fighting to keep the food allocated to him and if there was even a hint of something different or expensive on him you can guarantee it wouldn’t be his any longer within a few hours of discovery.

Due to Harry’s fundamental refusal to be a scapegoat, doormat or abuse victim he did always seem to eventually end up the leader of any clique he became a part of.

This caused the elder children to both fear and envy him. 

This caused the peers of his physical age to either constantly challenge him or ignore him.

Because of the Caretakers herding and the constant mixing of cliques due to losses and ‘advancement’ Harry did eventually end up with a group of five that seemed to refuse to die.

Two were a set of twins that were so identical they seemed to speak as one. They had the traditional looks of long black hair, yellow eyes and purple eyeliner.

One was a huge brute of a ten year old that had a mass of wild crimson hair cropping out of his head and deep blue eyes that seemed to be soaked in sadness.

The last two was a brother and sister set that refused to trust anyone but each other. This caused them to be highly effective with each other but not so much with others. The boy was bald and refused to let any of his hair grow and the girl had braided her long silver hair back with the local equivalent of barbed wire.

Harry was shoved together with the twins first and then the brother/sister were shoved in and finally the huge brute was dropped with them as a last addition. 

The Twins had fought with Harry and he came out dominant while the Brute never fought Harry’s rule he just watched everything constantly with wary eyes. The BroSis set had refused to acknowledge or listen to Harry till one group session resulted in Harry extracting the Brother from a sticky situation.

When Harry had finally started settling in with these children Harry was still hurting emotionally. He hated having these children huddled under his wings and he yet couldn’t leave them alone.


End file.
